Thursday, November 8, 2007

Again on that Writer's Strike

Or, as I like to call it 'The reason all my phones are dead'.

If you're still unsure why the Writer's are striking, or what the big deal is, check out this youtube video, posted by the unitedhollywood.com group featuring 'The Office' staff.

They describe writing 10 'promotional' mini webisodes for nbc.com for which advertising was sold(meaning the network made money on them) , and for which they won an emmy and were not paid.



In this industry - creativity often takes a second place to money. This is a business, after all.

The last time writer's negotiated dvd residuals were in 1988, when VHS were barely being released. They had no way of knowing that nowadays most movie studios recoup most of their money and make most of their profits is through the astronomical selling of home video.

The writers also gave up an increase on those residuals in an effort to avoid a strike, which was a major point of contention. It didn't help.

Thus far, neither side has attempted to reconvene.

Man. This thing is gonna drag out forever.

Please - don't fire me before I get a real job, kthanks.

On a slightly funnier note - apparently some wannabe writer went to the picket lines to drop off a script, in hopes he could get the actual (non)working writers impressed enough to... what - join the striking guild?

Their response was to throw the script in the street so the cars could run over it, and then stage dramatic readings of the recovered pages.

Writers are pissed, people. Don't mess with that!

... I wonder what would happen if I wrote a really shitty script on purpose and tried to get them to act it out?

Best Actor Gesture of Support for the Striking Writers goes to Steve Carrell - who called in sick due to a case of 'enlarged balls'. Indeed, Steve. indeed. Would you like to to go with me to the pants party?

2 comments:

  1. I actually feel bad for script guy :( There's probably a story in there somewhere. Although, under the circumstances, not a script.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I feel a little bad for him. But then I think about how much balls it took for him to do that when these guys on the picket line have no idea when their next paycheck is coming.

    And it becomes kinda awesome. :-D

    ReplyDelete